Monthly Archives: September 2012

If you haven’t figured it out already, I love food. I’m also officially a big kid, with a big kid job at a lovely non-profit. If you know anything about working in a non-profit, you know that this means one has a job title that is actually a loose description of what one does, and one actually wears many, many hats in their organization, in order to make it run as smoothly as possible. Well, one (I’m talking about me here) can sometimes be a volunteer coordinator.

It’s been a while since I’ve posted a recipe, hasn’t it? Well wait no more! I know I’ve said it once, I’ll say it again, I love pizza. It could have to do with my not-so slight obsession with cheese. Or the fact that I can eat a whole can of black olives in one sitting. By myself. The problem with pizza is that I either have to order one over the phone/at a restaurant, or I have to buy pizza dough and whatever toppings I’m feeling like that day. I mean, who wants to leave their house just to have the deliciousness that is pizza? (Hint: not me!) Well the lovely Ms. Kimberly at Poor Girl Eats Well, one of my favorite food blogs, has changed the way I get my pizza fix!

I love bacon. Especially crispy bacon with extra cheesy scrambled eggs, and an English muffin. But I digress about breakfast foods. Except the bacon.

Whenever I have friends come into town, the majority of them want to go wine tasting. I really can’t blame them. The Napa Valley is very much synonymous with wine tasting. I happen to be the kind of girl who would much rather go food tasting, than wine tasting (only if I had to choose between the two!). I would hope you would have realized how much I love food by now!

Over Labor Day weekend, my dear friend Kortni came down from Portland to grace me with her presence. This was only her second time to the Valley, and I was determined to whisk her taste buds off their non-existent feet. Obviously, it meant I was going to break out the big guns to achieve this. I started off her trip with a visit to the restaurant I take my favorite people to enjoy one of my favorite meals: Murphy’s Irish Pub.

Want to hear something fun and exciting? Of course you do! I made a Twitter account for my blog (cue the hoorahs and applause).

With the explosion of views and heaps of new followers I received last week (70 views in one day just about blew my mind. For real.), I figured I should get my booty in gear for reaching out to other fabulous people who just might want to read about my adventures in food, travels and craftiness!

If you haven’t noticed, I love taking pictures of my food. While I don’t always blog about my foodie adventures, I am pretty good about posting it on my Twitter via my Instagram. A girl’s gotta have some help making pictures interesting! So, I now have a way you can get little sneak peeks on what I may, or may not, be blogging about: follow my Twitter! 🙂

Here’s your homework: if you have a Twitter account, log in and start following @InNatsShoes (the full blog name was already taken *sigh*). If you don’t have a Twitter account yet, go to Twitter, create one, and then start following me. If you are totally against signing up for a service that only allows you to express yourself in 140 characters or less, feel free to stop by my blog and check out the Twitter feed to the right of my posts– I’ve got your back.

I appreciate your support and look forward to my followers and any (well, as long as it isn’t malicious!) feedback from you all.

Guys, I just read about, and then immediately signed up for, the coolest thing. Quite possibly ever.

So, sometimes I get nosy.. When people like or comment on one of my posts, or start following my blog, I check out their site. I swear I’m not stalking! I just want to know a little bit about the person interested in what I have to say, and to see if we have any common interests (read: to see if I want to read their blog, too!). Sometimes I even start following their blog (as is the case with The Lazy Travelers— those girls seriously make my day). Occasionally, their blog leads me to other fabulous blogs! Well, yesterday exactly that happened. The ever lovely WordPress sent me a notification that vincentesf liked my Pot Pan Thai post. So, I snooped on his blog Vittle Monster. Among other drool-worthy food posts, he had a post up about something called Foodie Pen Pals. Being a girl who loved having pen pals growing up (and still has email pals from all over the world) I was instantly intrigued. At the end of his post, there was a badge to click for more information. Obviously, I clicked it!

Turns out Lindsay from The Lean Green Bean started this really awesome program in September of 2011. She receives contact information from people who want to be involved in a food exchange and pairs up two individuals from within the US or Canada and for those in the UK, she directs them to Carol Anne from This Is Rock Salt. Everyone paired checks in with their partner for the month to verify food allergies, dietary needs, and preferences. Then they each go out and collect a sampling local foods, favorite foods, or whatever, as long as the total of the goodies purchased is within the $15 limit, and ships it to the person Lindsay paired them with. Lindsay requests that each box contain something written (a note, an explanation of the goodies inside, a recipe, etc.) and that if you are a blogger, or even just a willing reader, provide a guest post! One could potentially receive snacks from all over their country every month!

According to Lindsay’s site, new people (or people who have not participated in recent months) need to sign up before the 5th of every month in order to be partnered with someone from their country. Since I signed up on the 4th, I just made the cut and received my confirmation email from Lindsay. Obviously, I’ll keep you all up to date on my experience with this. I’m really excited as if you couldn’t tell!!

It’s crazy for me to think that two years ago August 27th, I was boarding a plane to the Czech Republic. Two years ago this week, I met some of the most amazing people who I am still lucky enough to call close friends, despite being geographically distant, who came from all over the world to embark on a study abroad adventure beginning in Prague. I was able to travel all over Europe with them and once we were back in our respective homelands, all over America with them.

It’s no secret that I love Thai food. A while back I wrote about how I fell in love with Thai food at a restaurant in Napa. And yes, to this day, the owner of Mini Mango Thai Bistro recognizes me and knows my order, down to substitutions. While in Chicago last month, my co-traveler Mel and I stumbled upon a great Thai restaurant. Out of all of the restaurants I tried in the Midwest, Pot Pan Thai was my absolute favorite.